The New Testament In Its World Book Review

 

889 pages that I had hoped to finish over the summer, at one chapter per night was actually finished by Christmas when the pace slowed to one chapter per week. 😳 This book is touted as graduate seminary-level first year. I'd say it's not enough, it would need more supplementary readings.

I have MANY notes but I put them inside the book and I haven't decided what to do with them yet. I might transpose them out (likely) or will re-read and simultaneously transpose (somewhat likely) or use the book as reference and look at my notes from time time (less likely).

I'm not a voracious book reader, I tend to read non-fiction quickly in digital formats being an online omnivore for more than 2 decades.

What I lose in time, I make up for in volume 🌊

In this book's case, however, I read not only the hardcover but I have the workbook (shown in the image) and I have the matching video series. I also followed Michael Bird on Twitter, but so far, no reply to my few tweets in his direction, which is doubly ironic, don't you think? 🐦

Right at the end of the workbook, it asked 5 questions which form a nice book review:

The biggest 'aha' moment you had:

So hard to pick, but the parallel texts from the Roman leaders complaining about the Christians were interesting-- particularly for their blandness. 'These Christians don't do much of anything and yet everyone thinks they are weird' seems to be the befuddled tone.

Your biggest disagreement with the book:

In a few places, the book uses too much "negative language" to express something.  So a statement like this:  

It should never be done to touch a hot stove.  

This is harder to understand than:

Do not touch a hot stove.

I could feel when the authorship changed, which isn't bad, but there were times when it felt like the book was one author speaking to a group of other authors like "scribbling in a bathroom stall"

The strangest thing you read in the book:

Chapter 2, The New Testament As History; learning the difference between modernity, post modernity and critical realism. I've read that part at LEAST 2x and need to spend more time on this.

The funniest thing you read in the book:

It wasn't really in the book, but in the video, N.T. Wright uses what must be northern English phrases aplenty.  "Get on with it" is a common English phrase but Wright uses a few more obscure ones. These are phrases which soar in sermons, yes, but stumble a bit in textual contexts. If I imagine Wright saying it, it rolls a bit better.

The wisest thing you read in the book:

Another very hard thing to pick out. I appreciated all the work that went into describing the background, the "in its world" part of the book; the Roman emperors, the Jewish culture, the writing, the traveling, the churches, synagogues,writing, etc.

The concluding paragraph - notwithstanding the prior 888 pages and hat-tipping to the 100-pages-that-will-keep-you-warm-at-night-flipping-through-concordance-- is beautiful.  If I may and with no copyright violation (I claim Fair Use), I share it with you as I think the authors' voices come through:

"The church, because, it is the family that believes in the new creation, a belief constantly reinforced by the New Testament, should stand out in every city, town, and village as the place where hope bursts forth. Not just hope that something better lies in 'the hereafter'; rather, a belief that God's new world has been sown, like seeds in a filed, and that is is already bearing surprising fruit. The life of the new world has already been unleashed in the present time, and what we do as a result of that life, that spirit-given direction and energy, is already in itself part of the new world that God is making. Where this hope takes root, the story told by the whole New Testament comes to life again and again; through Jesus, and by his spirit, the new world has been born. All that we do in the present, in working for justice and beauty, in searching for truth in every sphere of life, above all in speaking cheerfully and wisely of Jesus is rooted in the scriptures, both of Israel and of the early church, and is designed to produce hope. When that hope is present, it will thus reinforce, for communities and individuals of every sort, the message which the New Testament proclaims on every page."